The present application relates to mechanical mounting, and more particularly, but not exclusively, to mounting a generator set to a base.
In most applications, during normal operation, the engine and its supporting skid will have different temperatures. In some applications, it is occasionally desirable to fabricate power generation equipment from components of dissimilar materials that have different thermal coefficients of expansion—such as iron and steel. When these components are mounted together, routine startup and shutdown thermal cycling can induce unwanted mechanical stress cycles that may lead to failure of the mount and/or other components. Such failures can lead to increased vibration levels and even more catastrophic failures.
Moreover, for a base (such as a skid) to have sufficient strength and rigidity, it is often made out of hollow support beam members, typically in the form of rectangular steel tubes (RSS). Rigidly attach an engine or generator to such structure frequently involves application of a bolt and a threaded nut or similar fastening device. To apply sufficient assembly torque to this bolt/nut arrangement, either the bolt or nut is rigidly attached to the inside of the member (by welding or the like), or sufficient access (such as a large access hole) is provided to facilitate application of a constraining device (such as a wrench) to the bolt or nut to prevent its rotation during assembly. Both of these approaches may add cost and increase assembly time. Further, if one fastening component is rigidly attached by welding, failure of the component may be very expensive to fix.
Thus, there is an acute need for further contributions in this area of technology.